THE CAVALRY BIT-AND-BRIDOON". 67 



hand and spurs pressed home, the horse dashes on as the 

 victor or the vanquished to meet another foe, or rejoin 

 the ranks. The fate of empires have been decided by 

 cavalry charges in less time than it takes to read tliis 

 parao^raph. Cavalry attacks are sharp, short and de- 

 cisive, for either victory or defeat. 



The interested reader Avill understand that, to get a 

 balancing purchase to enable the swordsman to put more 

 power into the sword-arm in thrusting to the front, the 

 left hand pulls on the bridoon bit while the right hand 

 delivers the point, rendered all the more effective by the 

 velocity of the charge. Pulling the bridoon rein with all 

 one's might for the instant, balances the body and thus 

 gives the right arm corresponding power to push, which 

 it could not have if the body had no support from the 

 bridoon rein in running the antagonist through. This 

 lever ^^ower could not be had from the other rein, for 

 the severity of the curb and curb bit would not admit of 

 it from that source ; and the horse, instead of rushing 

 forward in response to the spurs, would halt and fall 

 back, the very reverse of the action necessary to give ad- 

 ditional force to the forward thrust in such a hand-to-hand 

 conflict, which frequently takes place in cutting down 

 the cavalry antagonist, capturing the standard or the de- 

 fenders of batteries that have got the range, and are mow- 

 ing down the troops of the assailant. If we reverse this 

 action of the arms and rest the left hand on a box the 

 height of our knee, what strength it gives the right arm 

 to lift a weight that, from want of balancing powers, we 

 could not " wind." 



In pursuing a defeated army the infantry soldier turns 

 his bayonet to the cavalry pursuer, who, in passing him 

 by, gives him a slashing rear cut, and should he fire after 

 his assailant the next swordsman cuts him down before 

 he has time to reload or fire again. But in these days of 

 modern improvements in fire-arms the pursuing cavalry 



